


Tales From Beyond Cray

by iceyly



Category: Cardfight!! Vanguard
Genre: Gen, M/M, do not copy to another site
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:54:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 3,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23951134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iceyly/pseuds/iceyly
Summary: aka my collection of Tumblr ficlets, drabbles, ect. from around 201401: Need – Kai/Ren S1 Missing Scene02: LM!Emi Drabbles03: Alternate LM AU (Kai/Aichi)04: Kai/Miwa (S3)05: Kai/Ren post-S2 ficlet06: Ren & Tetsu Drabble
Relationships: Kai Toshiki/Miwa Taishi, Kai Toshiki/Sendou Aichi, Kai Toshiki/Suzugamori Ren
Comments: 1
Kudos: 13





	1. Need

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I need this – RenKai"

He needs this, Ren knows, this fight here and now and the victory that his PSYqualia is promising in soothing whispers.

(Blaster Dark kneels by his side, his sword sharp and ready to do what need be, “ _It will be done, my Vanguard!_ ”)

He doesn’t need Kai’s support or understanding, doesn’t need his acceptance of the greatness that this power has brought him. Ren doesn’t need him to be the pillar he once had wanted him to be – the third member of the Foo Fighters, as planned and promised in a tiny shed behind their school they had come to call their own – until one fateful day in this very building now nearly two years earlier.

But he needs this fight, _craves_ it even – the opportunity to press up close against the hell fires of Kai’s fierce Kagero, to burn but not be burned. No matter what Kai thinks, no matter what trump card he’s certain to grant him the win, there is only one true _Overlord_ here. He will triumph and prove once and for all what great a mistake Kai made when he rejected Ren and his PSYqualia.

It’s a thrill, he admits, even though he knows the result with utter certainty – except for this one tiny moment when Kai rides _Draconic Overlord the End_ and all voices fall silent and Ren’s heart leaps in uncertainty because in just that one second his victory isn’t as inevitable as he is accustomed to. It’s a fight unlike any he’s fought before, worthy of himself, and of Kai; the man he loathes like no other.

After all, Kai is the one who drove him to seek power and rejected him once he found himself surpassed. He is the one that all that Ren has become traces back to.

Kai was _The Beginning_ and he’ll be _The End_ of this chapter of Ren’s existence, sealed with this victory and left to be forgotten in pursuit of the vision that lies beyond the National Tournament.

(The world is his for the taking now.)

It ends like Ren has predicted from the start, an overwhelming victory that leaves Kai shaken and cracked, broken worse than he once broke Ren. It’s _satisfying_ to see him like this, to watch that tiny shred of hope that he’d clung to during that last Damage Check fade from his eyes, drowned away by everlasting despair.

Ren doesn’t mean to return after he’d declared himself free of Kai, of any bond they might have shared regardless of in hate or friendship, and led Asaka and Tetsu away.

(Neither of them will never let him down, he knows, will never abandon him – or he will abandon them before giving them any space to make that choice).

Still, this building is his, and therefore he knows of all that happens within its walls. He can’t quite help reconsidering when Kai lingers behind.

He may be free of him, but maybe there is one last point to be driven home for good.

Kai is in the hallway just outside their previous fighting stage, sitting against the wall, cracks and break lines the loss has left him with showing clear for Ren to see. The sight of them is exhilarating.

When Ren finds him, Kai perking up faintly at the sound of nearing footsteps.

(And there is that glimmer of hope again, when he recognizes Ren. Which is precisely why this point has to made.)

He doesn’t demand to know why Ren is here and Ren doesn’t offer to explain, only allows him to see the hint of a smile as he crouches down and takes Kai’s face between his hands.

He doesn’t offer to explain the kiss that follows either, because maybe they are both just a little too caught up in the brush of warm lips and the hesitant reply to that. Ren draws back before it goes any further, just enough so he can see the other’s eyes, his hands still cradling Kai’s cheeks.

The glimmer of hope has become a burning light similar to the fires of Kai’s deck, the burning spirit that had attracted Ren to him in the first place – ever bright and everlasting.

Ren is just about to finally extinguish it for good.

“Kai…”, he whispers as he leans forward again, grip firmly holding Kai in place when he tries to surge forward again to meet him halfway for another kiss, but that is not what Ren is aiming for anymore.

Instead he breathes that one single message against his lips, and surely this time it will stick.

“I do not need you.”

Not anymore. Not ever again.

He smiles truly when he sees that last light finally shatter for good, collapsing along cracks and break lines just as it should have the first time already.

(When he walks away, he doesn’t look back.)

_\--- Fin ---_


	2. Untitled LM!Emi Drabbles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For all that Emi has always been an only child, whenever her thoughts stray to the topic of siblings and she wonders just what it would be like to have one herself… she imagines an older brother.

For all that Emi has always been an only child, whenever her thoughts stray to the topic of siblings and she wonders just what it would be like to have one herself… she imagines an older brother.

He’d be soft spoken, she thinks, and a bit of a wimp probably and definitely absolutely no use in the kitchen whatsoever. But he’d also be kind and patient, even when he needs Emi to take charge of his life because he wouldn’t get _anything_ done properly otherwise.

It’s a silly thought of course, because Emi is and always has been (and likely always will be) an only child. And anyway, aren’t older siblings supposed to be confident and outgoing? Nevertheless, when her English class assigns that question as essay, this is the imaginary brother she writes about.

(Sometimes, in the mornings, she finds herself knocking furiously against the door of the storage room on the upper floor, but before the name caught on her throat can escape her lips, she’s already forgotten it again.)

* * *

“Where is your brother today?” Kai-san asks, and Emi just looks at him in wonder – she doesn’t have a brother, or a relative named Aichi.

Days later, she watches him Fight, and when he Rides _Blaster Blade Seeker_ she frowns faintly – there is something so very familiar about the card and about the words he calls onto it with.

She just can’t put a finger on it.

The new boy, who’s been starting to come around Card Capital – Kamui-kun – stutters with wide eyes when she smiles and asks him for a Fight, and somehow knows her name before she can even introduce herself.

(Misaki-san slaps the back of his head when he mentions “Aichi-oniisan”, and though Emi wants to ask what that was about, the faintly distant look of sadness on both their faces makes her hold her tongue.)

“What made you first start playing Vanguard?” the Manager asks, and though Emi is sure it was a relative that taught her, she can’t remember who.

(She remembers a flash of blue hair and a small smile and thinks of her mother… except, she knows for sure that it wasn’t her. Again, for just a moment, she wonders.)

* * *

Every other night, Emi dreams of sitting with Aichi in their living room, of berating him for one thing or the other, of watching TV together or of playing Vanguard and seeing the gleam in his eyes that lights whenever there are cards in his hands.

(It is the brightest when he draws, rides or calls his avatar, _Blaster Blade_ ).

She dreams about winning and losing, and the way her brother laughs gently whenever she pouts up at him after particularly close games. She dreams of moments that are normal and everything she misses, if she lingers on it for too long.

Still… once their mother calls for dinner, he always steps back, and for all that Emi wants to reach out to take his hand so she can tug him along into the kitchen – if he’s already downstairs, she’s not going to let him out of helping with the dishes – she just can’t reach him, no matter how hard she tries.

“I can’t stay, Emi,” he tells her with a sad look in his eyes.

It’s different to the one from two years ago, from before he found Vanguard. He looks so much more grown up now than he did then, and for all that he’s sad, Aichi is without a doubt more determined than ever.

Somehow, she doesn’t dare to argue with him, even though she wants to.

“I really miss you,” she blurts out instead, and tries to reach for him again – even if he can’t stay (he should, it’s silly that he can’t, that he leaves her and their mother alone, that he leaves them behind like the father she can’t remember either), he could at least leave with a hug!

Aichi just smiles and replies in kind before he fades away and out of her dream.

(When Emi wakes up, her heart aches faintly like she’s missing something or someone, but try as she might she can’t remember who she’s lost.)

_\--- Fin ---_


	3. Alternate LM Ending

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From Tumblr: "Void!Aichi’s Judgement is emotional pain. Since all of the Quatre Knights inflict “physical” pain, Aichi’s is emotional. The loser goes through all the heartbreak they’ve ever experienced ex. losing parents, failing someone etc etc"
> 
> What do you mean, this wasn’t supposed to be a fic prompt?

Kai’s eyes linger on that last card that falls into his damage zone, hopes for the Heal Trigger he needs to turn this Fight around and sets his shoulders when he doesn’t. He knows what’s coming, the rise of dark energy off of his own damage zone and Aichi’s is unmistakable, but he’s been struck by the Judgment before.

He has suffered the pain of Gaillard’s flames and it hadn’t stopped him, and neither will this – he may have failed this once, but Aichi never gave up on him. So, Kai won’t give up on him either, no matter how many fights it takes.

The darkness closes around him and for a second Kai is confused. There is no pain, no fire or lightning, no vines or ice lashing out to hurt him, nothing and nobody but himself alone in the dark–

“ **Picture it, Kai-kun** ”, Aichi’s voice whispers and that’s when-

_He’s standing in front of his parents’ grave and tries to make sense of it, wonders about the why and for the very first time Kai feels left behind and just so utterly alone–_

_It’s madness that brightens Ren’s eyes, madness and a power he doesn’t understand, and not even being cut down by Blaster Dark hurts as much as not being able to reach him._

_As not being able to reel Ren back to reality and remind him of the carefree days before._

_(For all that Kai aims for the top, for all that he keeps seeking strength… he’s never wanted any more than what they used to have)–_

_Except when he tries that second time, and the critical Heal Trigger doesn’t come to his hand–_

_The ground is hard against his back and the weight of failure even heavier on his mind – he’s failed Dragonic Overlord and Ren, and Aichi most importantly. He’s failed when winning never felt more important and he just wants to_ apologize _–_

_He watches Aichi and the Miyaji Academy’s Cardfight Club, and how the distance grows and grows and grows (to lengths that not even The End can cross)–_

_“Miwa… I… Right now, they are too far away from me. Ren and Aichi both.”_

_He’s always held so hard to the lines he’s set after that first loss to Ren and even before: never run, only ever fight with your own strength. But it’s not enough anymore, is it? It wouldn’t be enough against Aichi or Ren, he knows that even without fighting either of them directly. Right now, it_ isn’t _with Takuto and right now, at this very second, he just wants_ more–

_More, and more, and more strength, the title of strongest he’s always aimed for. Now there’s no more restrains to hold him back, not even his conscience. For all that he’s closed his heart to the Reverse, he doesn’t care who he hurts along his way–_

_Except that maybe he does and the knowledge of another slip just waiting to happen if he stays in their lives is unbearable and that’s why he knows he can’t stay, he can’t keep on, he doesn’t deserve–_

_Aichi is gone from the world, gone from each and every memory but his own and Kai doesn’t understand and wonders_ where _–_

_He faces Gaillard of the Quatre Knights, heart aching whenever he catches those glimpses of Aichi in him, and clenches tightly when the last card falls into the damage zone. The shock of seeing_ Monarch Sanctuary Alfred _in the other’s hands sits deep, but in the end this Judgment is just insult to injury, for all that the flames leave him collapsed–_

_Finally, they find him within the depth of the Quatre Knight’s lair – a different dimension of its own, it seems – but when Aichi awakens, it’s faint regret that flashes through his face._

_“I see, my knights weren’t enough to warn you away,” he says and the gleam in his eyes is familiar, too familiar. It’s exactly what Kai used to see in his own after he accepted the Reverse, and that realization makes it so unbelievably hard to breath–_

Kai can’t remember at which point he’s fallen to his knees or when he bowed his head. He doesn’t know when the tears had started to slip down his face.

When the darkness leaves him, he’s left shivering from too many emotions, all too close to the surface to process properly and hurting in ways that can’t compare to Gaillard’s flames of Judgment in the slightest after all.

Kai kneels frozen to the spot and for all that he wants to move, for all that he wants to push back to his feet again and again and reach out for Aichi, he can’t.

He can’t even so much as move his head to look up when Aichi crosses the distance and gently traces along his cheek, as if to wipe away the tears.

“They warned you,” he says and the regret is still lingering in his voice. Kai knows that if he were to look up, he’d see the light of the Void shining in his eyes as he commands: “Do not chase me any longer, Kai-kun.”

For once, Kai can’t find the strength to protest and that’s when the darkness takes him for good.

\--- _FIN_ \---


	4. S3 KaiMiwa drabble

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Originally a Three Sentence drabble, now edited to flow better!

Days and days, weeks have passed since Kai accepted the power of Link Joker. They’ve been filled with Fights and travels from one place to the next and he knows he’s grown stronger.

He’s so very close to mastering the deck in his hands – it’s not much longer until he can challenge Aichi and Ren (and after that, it will be Takuto’s turn).

Kai is constantly on the move, either checking his deck or searching out Fighters, and once a Fight is done, he turns his back and walks away as the Reverse takes his opponent.

The only time he doesn’t, that opponent is Miwa – Miwa, who’s come to stop him and falls short, who shoots him that regretful smile and calls him ’ _stubborn as always_ _‘_ , while the Reverse takes hold of him.

Because in spite of all that’s happened, Miwa is his friend and this is the only way he can honor him as such.

Minutes later Miwa rises, smiles at him as brightly as ever and tells him not to worry.

“I got your back,” he says, and it’s a bit of a struggle to keep his gratefulness from showing.

At least to himself, Kai dares to admit that the past few weeks have been just a bit lonely.

_\--- FIN ---_


	5. Untitled post-S2 RenKai Drabble

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first thing that Kai becomes aware of when he wakes, is the smell of sizzling eggs and the annoyingly familiar sound of Ren’s cheerful humming. He doesn’t even try to suppress the groan that rises up in his throat.
> 
> Not when it‘s the fourth time he’s woken up to this exact scene in the past two weeks.

The first thing that Kai becomes aware of when he wakes, is the smell of sizzling eggs and the annoyingly familiar sound of Ren’s cheerful humming. He doesn’t even try to suppress the groan that rises up in his throat.

Not when it‘s the fourth time he’s woken up to this exact scene in the past two weeks.

He’s had the locks switched _twice_ since that first time he found Ren enthusiastically taking over his kitchen for reasons he has yet to reveal.

…Though knowing Ren there may not be a reason other than his need to be an utterly annoying _menace_ – and by now, Kai figures that a third attempt to change his locks probably wouldn’t yield any more success.

“Ren,“ he growls once he actually feels capable of holding onto a train of thought (outside of ’ _need more sleep_ _‘_ at least), “What are you doing in my kitchen?“ 

“How mean, Kai!“ is the unhurried reply he gets – the same as always. “You should be more considerate of your guests. Especially when they just came by to stock up your milk and eggs!“

Guests don’t break into his apartment on a whim, Kai doesn’t say and almost misses the tail end of whatever ridiculous excuse Ren is spinning more for his own amusement than to serve as actual explanation.

“It turned out that you didn’t need either, so I decided to help out with that at least,“ he says. ”There is no greater waste than leaving food to spoil, you know.“

 _‘It’s too early for this,’_ Kai thinks as he groans, burying his face in his pillow again. He starts weighting the pros and cons of exercising the effort it will take to get up and kick Ren out of his apartment.

One incredibly annoying, but very heavy weighting con is that, for all that he rarely exercises the skill (compared to Kai at least), Ren is actually pretty capable in the kitchen. And, for all that it’s _Ren_ , the chance of the kitchen burning down if he leaves him be is actually rather slim.

 _'Far too early,‘_ he concludes after another moment, turns his back to the nuisance that keeps busying himself with eggs and toast in his kitchen and falls back asleep.

_(He’ll deal with Ren once he’s actually awake. Probably.)_

_\--- FIN ---_


	6. Ren & Tetsu Drabble

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s just a matter of being properly persuasive, Ren knows.

It’s just a matter of being properly persuasive, Ren knows, just a matter of asking again, again and again. He’s seen how the cards had glowed in Tetsu’s hands, so there is no doubt that they belong there.

Ren just has to make him see.

And well… so, what if he’s taken to climbing into the toilet stalls, locking all of them safe one and then waiting out in it for Tetsu… among other things.

How else is he supposed to out-stubborn the other, after all?

Years later, Tetsu will never wonder much about just how he had ended up running the Foo Fighters for Ren. Rather, he will remember those days with a sigh and shake of his head.

It’s no good to linger on the past, no matter how much he might find himself longing for those simpler days sometimes, when he had found himself spending a surprising amount of the day trying to dodge that slightly weird, but incredibly presistant red-head, who just didn’t seem to have any concept of ‘giving up’.

_\--- FIN ---_

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, I went through my collection of WIP and finished fic files that never made on here, and decided to transfer them from tumblr, so they don't get lost, if tumblr goes on another Strike spree or something!
> 
> I'm not sure if I'm going to write anything new for CFV any time soon (though I did dig out some wip writing for G-Era Kai-Miwa-Ibuki stuff that is set in the Flatmate AU, so who knows). 
> 
> Either way, please consider leaving me a comment or kudos! :3


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